Joy is our carbon,
what we pull from air,
what we use to grow our essence,
what we use to make home
and sanctuary,
shelter and support
for all that we hold dear
We pull joy from the air
and give off that which blesses
other life, and, too, ourselves
Everything we’ve ever made
we’ve made from joy –
it is our gift, our legacy, our contribution.
Joy’s traces will forever show
where we have lived.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 28, 2022
In the softness of this cloudy day,
in the quietness of certain moments,
I remind myself,
and it starts to come back to me,
how I have been shown,
how I have been given
a way of walking here
where joy comes up under my feet
and floats from everything i see
I don’t want to keep it to myself,
I seek the deepening
that lets me give it
to everyone I think of
and everyone I see
I work it now in little ways
and wait to see it open up,
not by my will
but by my willingness,
not by expertise
but by grace.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 2, 2021
(Moments, 2nd iteration)
Where there has been euphoria –
light whipped like blond curls
triumphant in the wind,
sailing down the sound,
light pooled like coals
in the aftermath of dance,
light felt as heat
in the warm coursing deep within –
These moments have been places
where the veil was somehow rendered
more transparent –
where a faint gleam of true essence
has wakened me, if only slightly,
to what is present always,
and I think it’s fine
to seek, in each moment,
the place of thinning
where the eternal light
floods into view.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 12, 2021
Birds were singing and some trucks rolling
as we awoke and
untangled our limbs from our dreams,
and twined, one more time, together,
as the morning light started
to come in the window,
and we entertained the notion
of one or two more minutes
of lazy languor, though we knew
we would get up soon
We would bring with us
into the day
the sweet equanimity,
the readiness to bless,
the easy comfort
of having no one to judge
and everyone to appreciate,
much to do, but also
enough space, enough time.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 16, 2021
The coals sink down,
the room grows colder,
and the day’s memories
stretch like embers
for my mind to scan –
the times of being cold, of being warm,
the work, the company,
joy finally remaining
the last thing glowing
as I turn my attention towards sleep.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 31, 2020
Gratitude for joy at end of day
glows like coals in the cabin stove.
Remembrance of green shade
and steps made,
and some kind of entrance
into conscious freedom
rests easy in the evening hours –
strength and peace for now
and for the day to come.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 17, 2020
For a moment I forgot
that joy is unconditional —
I looked around, and saw,
then felt, the sadness
everywhere it lay along
the tragic and the casual
occurrences of unfulfilled conditions
The sighs arising
slip like wisps above them,
hover haunted, sink on down —
it’s easy to believe
no answer can be found for anyone
But joy is unconditional —
it cracks like a smile,
bounds up like a bubble,
flows, light filled,
through all the places
where things seemed so sad.
This is not a big problem, actually —
it’s just time to claim our heritage.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 29, 2019
We could be happy. I cried
as I thought of this,
so far removed it was
from what I’d told myself was possible
Oh, I had joy. Joy of the wilderness,
the upward trail, the bracing day,
joy of the stream of life
given every day by my Creator
After all this time of self reliance,
it was overwhelming to consider
that the gifts my Creator gives
include even more,
and we could be happy —
you and me together,
and others too —
We could be happy —
this, too,
is my Creator’s will.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 8, 2019
Though I talk about
techniques for survival,
I really mean
ways to maintain joy —
there is a level
where it amounts to the same thing
And it’s easy to find uplift
in the faces of young fathers
and their children,
in reachings out for connection,
in all these things that
right now
are of utmost importance to people,
however fleetingly they catch
the light-elixir that sustains us all.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 12, 2019
The lights are everywhere.
I see them, at times,
like chinks between the trees,
like smiles of pleasure and of recognition,
and at times like moonlight across fields,
silvery joy, opalescent peace
Sometimes I see them falling —
raindrops searching our their pathways,
sometimes I see them rising —
vapor in the morning sun,
in all the ways that they appear,
the same in essence,
ever called by hope,
answered in presence.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 17, 2019